Last night the Museum of East Anglian Life held the PV for my 8 month run of Edgelands.

Mrs O and I got there early to help with last minute preparations including limiting the number of people in the gallery on account of floor loading – a new threshold for the Museum!
The guests (49 I think) trickled through the delightful walled garden and it was somewhat surreal to see mostly pairs of people come through the gate in the wall almost as if they had stepped through a time portal. Guests had travelled far and wide to come to this event and I am still in awe at their efforts to get to Stowmarket for the briefest of encounters before melting away through the portal to whence they had come. I don’t think there could have been a better way to arrive at the Abbot’s Hall.

I had to give a little speech after Lisa Harris who welcomed everyone to the event and I used one of my packing crates as a soapbox.

I was aware that so many people had been milling about for some while and in my haste I am not sure I thanked everyone so here goes.

First I want to thank everyone who turned up. It was wonderful to see so many people from various stages of my life come to support the event.

Putting on a solo show does not mean that it is a one-man-band. This show took 12 months to organise and in the last week many willing volunteers and pressed men and women came to my aid to make it all happen.I would like to thank Kevin Marrable for the heavy lift of the massive C-types framed by Lamden into the van. To Peter Ellis for giving up a very long Monday on the first day of the hang and to Darren for getting the short straw of emptying the van with me. Terry and Peter were the pressed men of the day for the heavy lifting of images to the wall. A delicate task. Thank you so much.
Next we had Andy how was tasked with the equivalent job of the man at the foot on the ladder. He helped me hang all the medium format work and then to the twins on work experience who typed up spreadsheets, made up labels assembled cabinet displays, laid out my postcards and hoovered the floor. There are so many tasks that need to be done and all menial so a very big thank you to you all. Lisa was as calm as cucumber throughout all this and put in some very long hours. Elle who was with the Museum when we first debated this show – a big thanks for vetting the Arts Council Grants that sadly did not yield any funding. Some 18 weeks of the preparation for this show was in preparing two ACE funding requests. It is galling when all that effort does not deliver especially for an organisation that relies so heavily on donations of money and time by an army of volunteers to provide this wonderful facility in the heart of Suffolk. Pinky and his crew made up the children’s pop-up studio. A big thanks also to Jeanette and other volunteers who served on the night.

I’d also like to thank Kodak Alaris for sponsoring me to carry on making more images for this series. A very big thanks to Metro for the original big 5, The Print Space for the new 4 on dibond and to Owen Berry at MF Gallery & Frames for making up the new 21 medium format frames to match those Robin did last year. Redwood processed my medium format and large format negatives in this new chapter and UCS provided the vinyls so thank you all for your support.

The last but no means least person to thank is Mrs O for allowing to me to raid the piggy bank and throw our hard earned savings into this venture. Without her support and agreement there would no Edgelands work on the walls of the gallery.

One last thing- I’ll need some help in 8 months time when this lot comes down – volunteers?